OTISFIELD | His name is Amgad and at 18, he understands what’s expected of him as a camp counselor this summer. He’s here, he says, to help build bridges.
“That’s what we Egyptians have been doing for a long time,” Amgad said Tuesday. “I was born the year they signed the (Camp David) treaty, so peace with Israel has always been part of my life.”
Which is more than you can say for many of the kids who just arrived at the Seeds of Peace International Camp. As Amgad looked on in the mid-morning sunshine, a blur of adolescent exuberance representing seven Middle East countries converged on a soccer ball—their laughter cascading from the open field to the shores of Pleasant Lake.
“Look at them,” Amgad said proudly. “They’re a team already.”
It began five years ago in the mind of John Wallach, at the time the foreign editor for The Hearst Newspapers, who decided after the World Trade Center bombing that covering terrorists wasn’t enough—there had to be a way to stop them from taking root in the first place.
Seeds of Peace, he decided, might be the way. The concept was disarmingly simple: Gather together a mix of Arab and Israeli teenagers, bring them to the serenity of the Maine woods for a few weeks each summer and teach them that conflict resolution need not be a matter of who has the most stones or bullets.
“Nobody was paying attention to building peace at a time when the leaders were signing peace treaties,” Wallach said. “I decided you have to start with the young people.”
And so he did. For four years, Seeds of Peace has bounced from one borrowed location to another, skirting the edges of Maine’s normal summer-camp season. Now, thanks to a ten-year lease and an army of volunteers who spent months renovating the all-but-abandoned Camp Powhatan, Wallach’s labor of love has a permanent home.
“Amazing, isn’t it?” he said Tuesday, negotiating his golf cart past the freshly painted bunkhouses, dining hall, wood shop, art studio …
That it is.
They arrived Sunday evening, 175 bleary-eyed kids from Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Morocco, Palestine, Qatar and Tunisia. Over the next five weeks, they will split their days between recreation—baseball, tennis, soccer, swimming, sailing, water-skiing—and “coexistence session,” where the real work will be accomplished.
Amgad knows what to expect. He attended the first camp in 1993 and is now back as a counselor—the first alumnus on the staff. At times, he said, the tension will be palpable, the fear and prejudice as deep as the cold, clear waters of Pleasant Lake.
“I feel the pressure,” Amgad said quietly.
But he also feels the hope.
On Tuesday morning, the entire camp met at the main gate for the first-ever flag-raising ceremony.
One by one, the flag for each country unfurled. And one by one, the kids from that country proudly stepped forward and sang their national anthem—to the warm applause of their newfound friends.
Then, just before they walked arm-in-arm into a summer they’ll never forget, they watched one more flag rise—it shows three children projecting the shadow of an olive branch with “Seeds of Peace” stenciled across the bottom—and sang their new camp song.
Amgad, of all people, wrote the words. When it was over, campers representing every conceivable side of the Middle East conflict loudly cheered their young Egyptian role model.
“I was so embarrassed,” Amgad said later. “I’m not used to that.”
Who is?